Equinox 2025: First Light according to Constants

Walking Artist Kel Portman has an ongoing walking project where for the main turning points of the year - Equinox and Solstice - he is bringing together a winde range of walking artists from across the globe to walk together despite the distance.

On 21st December 2025 Artists were invited to creatively respond to the Winter Solstice event by making work that includes embodied cartography and walking as common factors. The walk had to be circular, referencing our orbit around the sun. Indoors or outdoors were allowed and it could take place whatever the weather and wherever in the world we were happen to be. I was on that day in Sønderborg, a peninsula in Southern Denmark, where my daughter Rachel currently lives. The house had a little courtyard, whose square provided a fitting map for a pyjama walk at a time when all the rest of the family were still asleep.

Here you find the full film made by all the accompanying artists. As my name starts with a Z for Zeiske, I can be found like most of my life as the last one on the tracks.

The poem accompanying it with the mappings is below.

Happy New Year. May it bring a lot of sunny days.

First Light according to Constants

It’s the 21st of December 2025

It’s 8.45 am CET

sunrise

Google says

where I am

a home from home

821 km

as the crow flies

west of home

Google says

I walk its terrace

a carré

of 4 square meters

I wander its inner circle

its circumference

I multiply its 2m diameter

by p

the constant

of 3.14

that’s 6.28m

I do that 6 times

That I walk the circle

That I circle the square

That I circle the time

That I time the light

That I light the year

That I year the steps

Step by Step

Schritt für Schritt

walk the darkness into light

around my circle

my little 3.14 sqm terraced sun

made up of pr2

its 8.46 am where I am

the sun has risen

at home they start at 8.42 am

another 56 minutes to go

Google says